Lost Battery Power

Agreed. As far as possible I've standardised on AA cells ( it's a factor in choosing to buy gear) and I use rechargeables for everything domestically

Sometimes I go to places where recharging rechargeables isn't an option and then I take disposable cells with me instead. I've never had a problem buying AA cells anywhere I've been.

With disposable cells, my sequence is camera, shaver, analogue radio, mp3 player. After the camera gives up, I'll get a couple of days shaving from my battery shaver then several hours radio listening and finally about five hours from my mp3. Anything left over goes into remote controls or clocks when I come home again.

Nick

Yes, I had thought about wall-warts. However, the 6-cell radio lives mostly in the bathroom, and there is no socket anywhere nearby, and I'm not going to run a cable in there. Not sure about the legality, either, unless it was the DC side. Since that is the one that gives up on batteries first, it is the one that I would get a power supply for if I ever did. The other radio is used mostly by the wife, and wanders frequently among three rooms, one of which is a shower room. She does not do technology, which includes plugging and unplugging a power feed into the side of a radio, or a wall-wart into a socket, when it can run on its own batteries. There is no logic to this, but that is the way it is. They live in a different universe.

Can't you use the batteries in the fanny hammer? they usually run until the batteries are really flat, tho if they do at the wrong moment, the moans will be of a different type :)

I modified the Roberts radio to take a 7 cell nicad pack from a surplus model aircraft..

since I already had a fast charger for those. its rated at 8.,4v instead on 9v but works just fine..freshly charged its a bit under 10v dead flat its 7v.

Not even a shaver socket?

Take the batteries out. Problem solved. ;-)

Tim

the internet is an alternative for all the usual stations - but I don't have the PC connected to hi-fi amplifier and speakers - I could but I prefer to listen on a wireless/tuner-amp and work on a a PC.

Truth to tell, I rarely use PC for that, but iPad is used that way quite a bit.

I use the tv tuner plugged into in the PC. freeview has all the radio..

No brainer. Rechargeables and a smart charger

See comment elsewhere about rechargeables having a lower working voltage than standard cells, and radios that cut off only just above the rechargeables' operating voltage.

No. The bathroom is in what we call the Victorian Extension to a house that is several hundred years old. It has one ceiling pull-cord light switch, and one ceiling light. And having looked up in the loft, I am not inclined to do anything up there!

Too late, she knows that they should be there!

But my point is really about wasted battery power in general, I was just using my own situation as an example.

look its just chemistry OK? we waste energy all the time every day.

Like responding to your weird crap.

The solution is to buy a battery carrier and make up an external big ugly battery box using rechargeable D cells and power it from that using the DC in socket on the side. That is what I did to my transistor radio in my university bedsit days before I had mains powered hifi.

You can get 8000mAH D cells these days. One extra cell in the stack with a series silicon diode that you short out with a switch when it gets low will allow you to harvest almost all the power out of it.

And in an external box it cannot harm the delicate electronics. ISTR that a certain size of plastic waste pipe was ideal for this duty.

There is a problem that for moderate loads the low terminal voltage of rechargeables does present a problem of premature low volts cutoff. But unfortunately that is how the chemistry crumbles.

1. Batterybox the radio sits on, with top contacts that touch radio bottom contacts. You can use an extra cell.
2. Lead acid battery
3. Hit your semidead batteries with spikes of current/voltage, and they'll rejuvenate. Leak risk increases, so an external battery carrier's best.

NT

Neither you, nor anybody else who does reply, is obliged to. It's their choice.

Indeed.

(1) would require adding external contacts to the radio, if it is ging to be wife-friendly and work as suggested. (2) is a possibility, series the cells so that there is greater voltage than the lead acid unit, and charge it up until the voltages match? Then add more, etc. (3) is a little more risky, as mentioned, but feasible.

No, there is no BBC radio on Freeview in the evenings in Scotland - they took the space for BBC Alba that no one watches.

or a battery charger :)

NT

to make it work seamlessly:

• radio has flat fixed contact areas for robustness, battery has sprung strips
• dry cells/nicads etc go thru a diode connected transistor, and the lead acid puts out a little more V, so when the external battery makes contact it takes over seamlessly.
• (Or you could use a relay with very low value R to limit the momentary i surge into the dry batteries. Use a fusible R in case the relay fails.)
• If you want you could add a comparator & LED that lights when the external batt's powering the set. Or change the display backlight LED for a bicolor and have it change colour when external power's in use.

It may be easier to use audio distribution. Once in place you can use it forever with all types of feed, and the cost & minor hassle of portable radios & batteries ends.

NT